


Path of Dust

by Rangto



Category: Deltarune (Video Game), Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Character Death, Desperation, Determination (Undertale), Drama, Guest Stars, Hope vs. Despair, Hopeful Ending, Hurt, Inspired by..., Multi, Other, Survival Horror, Thriller, Zombie Apocalypse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-15
Updated: 2019-04-15
Packaged: 2019-11-19 07:01:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 13,817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18132470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rangto/pseuds/Rangto
Summary: It all started with a single infected. Then came hundreds, and then thousands.Hometown never stood a chance.This is the story of three friends and how they are pushed to the brinks of sanity, endurance, and humanity.





	1. Antecedent

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It always begins with a single victim...

* * *

* * *

 

It was 2 AM, and most of Hometown was deep in slumber.

Undyne had already finished her nightly patrol and gone back to the station to catch a nap, the hospital was down to a skeleton crew as most nurses and doctors returned to their homes, and even City Hall was quiet and still, Hometown's mayor, who had been staying at her office well into the early morning hours the last few days, had finally gone home to catch some well-earned rest.

Hometown's residents were all deep in their slumbers as well. Kris, the town's sole human, was blissfully asleep in his bed in the safety of his room. Monster Kid, Snowy, Berdly, and many others were also tucked away within their apartments in the eastern part of town just north of the school. Susie slept uncomfortably on the floor after falling out of her bed, and Noelle lay snoring in the security of her estate.

Everything seemed to be perfect — just another restful night for the citizens of Hometown.

A human covered in blood and with tattered clothing materialized from the shadowed highway leading to and from Hometown. His eyes were glazed over, his skin pale as ice. His veins practically bulged out of the surface, and blood stained his chapped lips. Saliva foamed from the sides of his mouth and trickled down into his chin, his bloody teeth—jagged from overuse—longed for their next meal. His mouth was contorted into a soundless scream, with only raspy breathing and the occasional grunt coming from the bloodstained maw. His nails were covered in a mixture of mud, blood, and dead ashy dust, some of the skin on his fingers peeled revealing muscle and bone.

Slowly, the human staggered down the road.

 

* * *

* * *

 

  


**CHAPTER ONE:**

**Antecedent**

* * *

* * *

 

 

"Kero! Goodnight my sweet, sweet people, kero, kero!" A froggit shouted to the half-empty bar that sat near the outskirts of Hometown, its small neon light barely bright enough to attract any attention to itself, which, considering the place was a hangout for bike gangs and drifters, was probably for the best.

Despite the late hour, the froggit was still up and about, his afternoon of poker and drinking having gone better than expected. He skipped out into the almost empty parking lot and looked around for any drivers going back to Hometown. When he found none, he pulled out his phone and considered calling one of his buddies, but after seeing the time, he decided it was best to hop his way back home. If he kept his pace even, he could be there within two hours.

As the froggit clumsily bounced down the moonlit highway, he sang a happy little drunken song all the while unsteadily holding on to a beer bottle with his tongue. Occasionally, he tipped the bottle back and took a swig, the burn of alcohol a soothing sensation to the drunken monster as he waddled and sang in between hiccups and burps. After a long evening, he was ready to get his eight hours before having to be up to see his kid off to school. He would deal with the hangover later, especially since he had the next day off.

The sound of heavy, uneven footfalls and ragged breathing ahead caught the froggit's attention. He squinted his eyes and waited for something to happen, making quite the effort not to fall over face first into the asphalt. He hopped forward a little more, the darkness growing thinner as a figure began to emerge before the frog's very eyes.

At first, the froggit was taken back by what he was looking at. Aside from the Dreemurr boy, he had only ever seen other humans whenever he visited Ebott city. Though, as he got a better look at the stooped human figure before him, he began to notice that something about the man wasn't quite right. As the excitement of the moment passed, the frog's attention was turned to the slouching in the human's movements and the blood covering his tattered clothes. He didn't need to be an expert in human biology to know that blood wasn't supposed to be outside the body.

The froggit hastily and clumsily put his beer bottle on the ground as he quickly yet drunkenly hopped towards the human. "H-hey *hic* buddy. Are you *hic* al-alright? Kero, kero," he asked the human in a somewhat muffled manner.

There was no worded reply from the human, the only sound leaving his lips being a low and trained gurgle. Slowly, though, the man turned his head towards the frog, gazing at the amphibian monster with the utmost hostility.

The froggit, unnerved by the human's glare, took a hop back. He knew enough about humans to realize that when one gave you a glower, you were likely about to be hurt, ESPECIALLY if that human had a lot of killing intent. In such circumstances, even a single flick of a finger could be enough to dislodge a monster's head from their shoulders. "H-hey! I'm *hic* n-not going to hurt you, kero, kero!" the froggit said staggeringly. "Y-you're b-b-bleeding badly, kero, kero!"

The human let out an excited, throaty groan in reply to the monster's words, arms stretched forward and pace growing quicker.

In his drunken state, the froggit tried to hop backward to gain more space, but the beer bottle he had placed on the ground earlier happened to be on his path. His movement caused it to tip over, and he hopped right over it, causing him to lose his balance and trip backward. The monster was barely able to get back onto his feet when two cold and clammy hands snatched his head and easily lifted him off the ground.

"H-hey man! P-p-please *hic*, l-l-let me go, kero, kero!" the froggit cried out, his body flailing around in an attempt at loosening the human's grip, which was so tight that he could feel nails digging into his skin.

The froggit looked up, at last getting a good look at the human. Half of the skin on his face was peeled off, revealing the muscle and bone underneath. The monster's eyes widened as he saw the human open his mouth as wide as it would go, his teeth, jagged and broken as they were, sharp nonetheless.

"AAAAAAAAAA!!!!!" the froggit screamed into the night as a sickening crunch echoed through the empty highway, his frantic ribbiting falling on deaf ears as the human shredded into his neck, casually ripping away a chunk of green amphibian flesh, which the human slowly chewed like gum.

The froggit again tried to loosen himself from the human's grip, his vision wavering between clarity and haziness. Despite his drunkenness, the agony now spreading from his neck to the rest of his body threatened to send him into shock. He reached for his cellphone and began to dial a number as best as he could.

The human let out an unsatisfied grunt as the chunk of flesh in his mouth turned to ashy dust. He spat out as much as he could before going in for a second bite, this one digging deeper into the frog's body, tearing into the muscles and ligaments that allowed shoulder movement and the life-sustaining arteries found therein.

The froggit's eyes rolled to the back of his head as he dropped the cellphone on the ground. On the screen, the phone's autofill option showed a completed number, with the picture of a younger blue-colored froggit's face above it.

The sound of wet crunching echoed through the night. From the shadows, two more lumbering figures slowly materialized, their groaning and hissing almost lost among the sounds of tearing flesh and snapping cartilage.

 

* * *

* * *

 

Monster Kid awoke to his alarm blaring on his nightstand.

Little by little, the teen began to drag himself out of bed. He gazed at the clock's display. It was now 6:00 AM sharp.

With a yawn, he lazily hopped out of bed and slammed his face into his alarm clock's off button. He stretched and did a couple of sit-ups to get warm and limber for the day to come and grabbed some clothes with his teeth. He then made his way to the shower, where he began a near-hopeless attempt at bathing. There were only so many spots that his neck could reach, and the brush gripped in his mouth wasn't exactly the best-tasting thing in the world either. This wasn't the first time he had wished for a good pair of arms, or at the very least, a more prehensile tail like the one his parents had.

With his shower concluded, Monster Kid made his way back to his room. There, he kicked a spot on the wall, which then dropped revealing a contraption with many metal arms. With great care, the kid hung the clothes he would be wearing that day on each of the metal appendages. After he was 100% certain that he had gotten all his garbs hung, he walked to the middle of the device and took a deep breath. With another kick to the wall, he brought the contraption to life, the appendages quickly whirring and clicking as they moved up and down and side to side, each arm applying yet another layer of clothing for the armless monster.

Within five minutes, Monster Kid was fully garbed in his usual getup. The only thing he lacked was the cross around his neck, but that wasn't supposed to go on until he was ready to leave for school or church, at least, according to his parents. "The angel's blessing is nothing to take in vain," he repeated to himself as he made his way out of his room and towards the dining area.

"Good morning sweetie," a sweet, peppy voice greeted Monster Kid. "How's my little ray of sunshine doing today?"

"Mom!" Monster Kid whined, his cheeks turning a shade of red as he took a seat on the dining table, all the while giving his mother a soft frown.

Monster Kid's mom, a similarly armless monster, giggled as she grasped a kitchen pan with her tail. The teen, despite his earlier expression, quickly livened up as he too began to laugh. Both mother and son had a good chuckle as breakfast was served.

"So, any plans for today?" Monster Kid's mother asked as she placed a plate in front of her son. "You going to stay after school, or maybe hang out with Snowy for a while?"

Monster Kid shook his head. "Nope. Just a normal, everyday school day!" he replied just before diving his head into his plate of food and eating it much as a dog would. "Thwougwh, I wouwldwn't mwind sowmethwing inwterewsting happweniwng arowunwd hewrwe," he added, his lips still too full of food for him to be fully coherent.

"MK! Don't speak with your mouth full!" Monster Kid's mom chided.

Monster Kid swallowed down his meal and gave his mother a meek smile. "Sorry, ma." He looked at the clock hanging near the living room and noticed the time. 6:30 AM.

Quickly wolfing down the rest of his meal, Monster Kid stood up from the table. "Thanks for breakfast!" he shouted as he raced towards a towel affixed near the kitchen wall. After wiping his face clean, the teen rushed back to his room and gripped his backpack with his teeth, careful not to chew through the leather straps as he affixed the bag onto his back. "Just one more thing," he told himself as he rushed back towards the many-armed contraption.

With another kick, Monster Kid activated the machine yet again, and the last piece of apparel to complete his look came down gently, almost as if the device was paying it the reverence it was due. The teen lowered his head and allowed the necklace to slip past his spines and onto his neck. "The Angel blesses," he whispered as he stood back up and picked the piece of wall that had folded out to reveal the contraption with his foot, kicking it up and closing the mechanism, leaving behind nothing but a plain-looking wall.

Monster Kid rushed out of his room and into the living room, where his mother already had the door opened with a foot. "Bye ma! See you later!" he shouted as he stopped by her to get a kiss on the forehead.

"Have a good day at school!" Monster kid's mom shouted as her son made his way down the hallway and into the nearby flight of stairs leading to the apartment's lobby.

On the way, Monster Kid ran into Snowy, who looked considerably fresher than he was, likely on account of having arms with which to scrub and shower with properly. "Oh, Hey MK!" Snowy cheered as the two teenagers matched their pace. "Guess I'm not the only one 'running' late, huh?" Snowy said, snickering at what he no doubt felt was a great joke.

Monster Kid only rolled his eyes and feigned some laughter in response. He knew better than to criticize any of Snowy's puns, lest he brings an endless avalanche of them upon himself.

"So, why are you late?" Snowy asked his friend.

Monster Kid groaned. "Turns out that setting my alarm to 6 AM isn't quite early enough. Maybe if I set it to 5:45 AM?"

Snowy shrugged in reply. "I mean, it's not like Ms. Alphys cares about tardiness too much. Not to mention, we only live like, fifteen minutes away from the school." Snowy again snickered to himself. "Besides, 6:30 is the best time on the clock, 'hands' down!"

Monster Kid feigned another laugh as he and Snowy walked out of their apartment complex. The instant the two were greeted by the morning sun, the armless teen breathed in that sweet, sweet fresh air as he began picturing just what kind of day he would have. Maybe today would even be the day when the angel finally blessed him with a growth spurt. It would be remarkable if, by the end of the day, he had his very own sizeable prehensile tail.

Snowy and Monster Kid began their trek to school, the two teenagers chatting away over random things such as TV episodes and occasionally bringing up the latest memes online. As they neared the end of their block though, they noticed a trail of some strange red liquid and ash scattered on the pavement.

Snowy was the first to point it out, and the two friends followed the trail towards the alleyway between their apartment buildings that their teacher, Ms. Alphys, hung around before and after school while waiting for her 'cat' to show up.

Despite the sun having risen almost an hour earlier, the alleyway was perpetually cast in obscuration, the little light that did manage to break through serving only to accentuate the gloom, forming long wavy shadows that danced eerily against the backdrop of a spoiled and forgotten corner of Hometown.

Despite their every instinct telling them to turn tail and rush in the opposite direction, the two teens followed the trail, passing by the trash cans filled to the brim with wilting flowers, to the very end of the alley. There, the two heard the sound of munching and high pitched gasping. It was coming from two shadowed figure hunched low to the ground.

"Hey! It sounds like someone's hurt!" Monster Kid told Snowy. Hesitation all but abandoned in favor of benevolence, the armless teen raced forward to lend help to whoever might be injured. After all, in his mind, the angel instructed that one should help all those in need. As he approached the figure though, it let out a louder growl as it began rising.

Monster Kid froze in place as he finally got a good look at the two shadowed figures.

An unfamiliar human and a froggit with more than half his neck missing were chewing on what looked to have once been a lizard monster. The entire body was far too mangled to accurately discern an identity, the dissolving head all but stripped of any skin and muscle, and the chest violently ripped open, revealing soggy dust and the remains of an intestinal tract and a broken ribcage. The only thing that remained as a sign of the corpse's once-living identity were its yellow scales, short stature, and the tattered remains of a tacky dress.

Monster Kid's eyes widened as he slowly realized who the mangled corpse had once belonged to. Tears of sadness and fear began to well in his eyes as he fought the urge to scream the name of his teacher out loud.

Realizing the situation, Monster Kid began to carefully retreat from the horror scene. He shakily turned back to Snowy, who had his wings over his mouth as he too fought back the urge to let out a scream. As the teen turned away, he stepped on a discarded can, which crumpled under his feet with an audible report.

The sudden noise drew the attention of the two entities.

The human was the first to stand to this full height, while the froggit seemed to hang back, his interest still being on the corpse for the most part. Without any further hesitation, the human began moving towards the two teenage monsters.

Monster Kid wanted to run, but his legs wouldn't move. He could feel tears welling in his eyes as the human shambled towards him with ever-increasing speed. His focus was so set on the human, he didn't notice the froggit open his mouth and shot out a long black tongue, which wrapped itself around Monster Kid's chest.

"AHHHHHH! LET ME GO!!" Monster Kid shouted. "LEAVE ME ALONE!!" he begged to the froggit, who only looked on with cold, empty eyes. As the teen flailed, he managed to loosen the tongue's grip over his chest, but the froggit swiftly readjusted its grip. With a strained groan, the armless teen began pulling back against the tongue's grip. He almost managed to free himself again, but then he felt something tugging at the back of his neck.

With eyes wide in terror, Monster Kid looked down at his chest and saw his cross necklace coiled into the froggit's black tongue. With no arms, he had no means of removing the accessory as the frog used it to draw itself closer, allowing the frog to wrap the teen with the full length of his lapper. The frog then yanked on the youth's bound body, and he went down into the pavement face first, at which point the frog quickly began dragging the teenage towards him.

Monster Kid flailed and screamed as his eyes darted between the monster and human attacking him, and towards Snowy, who had fallen on his rear and was looking on with absolute terror, his eyes welling with an ocean of tears.

A sickening crunch echoed through the alleyway.

Monster Kid let out a scream of agony as he looked down and saw the human, who had previously vanished from sight, sinking his teeth almost an inch into his leg. Soggy gray dust oozed out of the wound as the human tossed his head from side to side in an attempt to dislodge a piece of flesh off the teen's leg. The froggit, meanwhile, continued dragging the youth with his tongue until his maw lined up perfectly with his neck.

Monster kid looked once toward Snowy, and then up towards the sky. As he felt hot knife-like teeth clamp down on his neck, he begged to the heavens, to the Angel—to anyone—for salvation, his eyes flooding with tears of pain, sorrow, and regret when it quickly began dawning on him that no help was coming. Slowly, he gasped out his last as his vision began fading to black, his mouth filling with the taste of his own dust.

The snowdrake watched with a look of anguish and horror as the human and froggit began ripping into Monster Kid's body. As he saw chunks of flesh being rent off the now corpse, he started hyperventilating. In his mind, the realization that he had just watched his friend get killed stabbed at his very actuality. Worse yet, he had just stood there and watched it happen. Despite his every instinct telling him to run and scream for help, his body refused to move an inch, his every muscle paralyzed with fear. He had so many tears in his eyes that he could barely see anything clearly, and no matter how many times he tried to wipe his eyes, he couldn't get any clarity.

Snowy heard another low moan echo from behind him. He instinctively turned his head to the source, but his blurry vision prevented him from getting a clear glimpse. Only when he felt a sharp, hot sensation erupt from one of his wings did he realize what had caused the cry.

The first stab of pain was soon followed by another, and then another. Before the snowdrake had a chance to process the events, he had been shoved into the ground, his vision finally clear enough for him to notice several shadowed figures looming over him, some already having their teeth buried deep into his flesh, yet others grasping at his feathered body in an attempt at gaining some leverage.

Then Snowy felt it, the sharpest and most excruciating pain of his life. He looked at the source, though he desperately wished he hadn't.

The clawed hand of what looked to be a wolf-like monster had found a way past all the other grasping hands and had plunged itself deep into his abdomen. Slowly, Snowy could feel the hand ripping and tearing through his innards, each second bringing with renewed agony as his very insides were torn asunder.

Finally, the clawed hand grabbed hold of something deep within the snowdrake's bowels. When the clawed hand retreated, it brought with it a long track of what Snowy was sure was supposed to be his small intestines. Spongy ash-like liquid splashed the faces and limbs of his assailants as those closest to the disemboweled organ chewed on it as it swung in the air, the pieces chewed off almost instantly dissolving in the mouths of the assailants as the mob of human and monsters moaned, hissed, and groaned in dissatisfaction.

Snowy's entire world was spinning, and his eyelids were feeling more cumbersome than ever before in his life. Despite his every attempt at maintaining some clarity, his vision began turning to a reddish gray tone as he felt more foreign hands reaching into his now exposed innards.

From elsewhere, more screaming erupted. Then more. It almost sounded like the entire apartment complex was exploding into a frantic din. Louder and louder it got, until all that could be heard was the uproar of dozens of frightened tenants.

Snowy wanted the screaming to stop. He wanted the pain to stop too, but the screaming... he wanted the screaming to stop even more. As he looked at the still shrouded faces of the entities slowly devouring his innards, he couldn't help but let out a chuckle. "Guess... I'm just that... ‘irresistible,’" he half mumbled, half gurgled on soggy ashy dust as his vision began to fade away...

 

* * *

* * *

 

The alarm blared into Susie's ear.

With a swift blow of her fist, Susie shut the contraption off. She looked at the time and grimaced. 7:00 AM; she could practically hear the school's tardy bell ringing in her head.  
  
With a deep sigh, and although she knew it would cause her no end of trouble later, Susie came to the sudden decision that she was going to skip class that day. She needed a break from school anyway, especially after the argument she had gotten into with her father the night prior. 'I mean, what does he know about a career choice? He's a security guard for fuck's sake! What makes him think he can lecture me?'

Susie huffed and sat on her bedside. ' _To think I was about to break my non-absence streak too,_ ' she regretfully thought to herself. Today would have been five months since the last day she had skipped class. She could hardly believe it, too. 'To think the last time I skipped class was the day I traveled to the Dark World with Kris,' she reflected warmly. The two hadn't been able to go back since, but she figured that just meant their job there truly had been completed. 'Still, I wouldn't mind seeing Lancer and Toothpaste Boy again...'

Susie stretched again and let out a yawn. Once school was out, she would hang out with Kris and talk about the whole situation with her father and his instance that she make something of herself. She chuckled to herself, ' _Even now, it's hard to believe that Kris is the only person in this damn town I can be open to,_ ' she thought, the corners of her lips rising as her thoughts turned to the sole human in Hometown. ' _Life-altering journeys through other worlds will do that, I guess,_ ' she mused, shrugging to no one in particular.

"SUSIE! GET OUT OF BED ALREADY! YOU'RE GOING TO BE LATE FOR SCHOOL!" a gruff voice roared from somewhere downstairs. "HOW ARE YOU PLANNING ON GOING TO COLLEGE IF YOU KEEP SCREWING UP LIKE THIS!?"

Susie's brow furrowed, her left eye twitching in rage. "I ALREADY KNOW, GODDAMMIT!" she roared back, "Fuck man, why can't he let that whole damn thing go already?" she asked to herself as she stood from her bed and grabbed her clothes off her closet before storming into the bathroom for a much-needed shower.

As she let the warm water caress her form, Susie thought of how to best ditch class. At first, she thought about going, checking in with the admin clerk, and then sneaking out while no one was looking. "Nah. Too convoluted," she told herself, at which point she thought of another plan, one involving her pretending to go to school, only to duck out of the way, wait for her father to drive off to work, and then sneak back into the house and enjoy the whole morning in solitude. "Yeah. That can work," she told herself, a wide grin forming on her lips as she settled on the plan.

She stepped out of the shower and rushed back into her room, dressing in record time and racing downstairs with newfound vigor. "Okay, I'm off to school now!" Susie yelled to her father, an eight-foot-tall dragon-like monster dressed in guard uniform—black cargo trousers, a blue long-sleeve collared shirt with various straps to hold keys and a radio, and a pair of shiny black boots.

As the older dragon sat on the kitchen table chugging down a plate of eggs and ham, he snorted and gave his daughter an inquisitive scowl. "Susie," he started, putting down his plate of food and looking right into his daughter's eyes. "Why did you wake up so late today?" His eyes narrowed. "Were you out late again with that boyfriend of yours?"

Susie' cheeks turned a darker shade of purple in response to her father's words. "D-DAD!" she yelled, her brow crumpling and her lips parting into a sneer. "KRIS IS NOT MY BOYFRIEND!"

Susie's father snorted. "Yeah, keep telling yourself that," he retorted. "Anyone with half a brain can see you two are a thing." His expression darkened, yet a grin on his lips formed. "I just hope to god you two are at least using protection. I'm not ready to be a grandpa just yet."

Susie's cheeks somehow managed to turn an even darker shade of purple as her eyes widened in absolute horror. "I-I can't believe I'm hearing this bull!" she turned away from her father and let out an exasperated groan. "G-goodbye, DAD!" she yelled, not even bothering to look back at the smug grin plastered on her father's lips.

"Hey, just don't do anything stupid!" Susie's father shouted back at her as she stormed out of the kitchen and into the living room. "Also, study more! I want my sweet, sweet kid to make it to college!"

Susie scoffed at her father's words and kicked her front door open. Without so much as waiting for her father's inevitable complaint about her methods for exiting a building, she slammed the door shut and walked out into the forest clearing that served as her house' front yard.

With a sigh of relief, Susie first looked around to get a better sense of her surroundings. Already, the sun was pretty high in the sky, almost clearing the treeline of the forest that circled her outskirts home. She walked down the gravel trail for nearly six minutes before making it to the highway leading to and from Hometown. She looked down both ways and found what she was looking for: the thickest bush of soft leaves around. ' _That will do,_ ' she thought to herself.

Without wasting another second, Susie hopped into the bush and took a knee, moving just enough leaves out of the way to give her a proper view of the T intersection leading to her home without exposing herself. Flipping her phone open, she looked at the time and sighed. ' _Ten minutes at the very least,_ ' she thought. ' _Small price to pay,_ ' she mused, the corners of her lips rising in anticipation of her scheme's payoff.

Only nine minutes after hopping into the bush passed before Susie's ears caught the sound of her father's car, the engine roaring to life as he let his vehicle fly down the gravel road. Since the highway to Hometown tended to be so empty—and the police so useless—he could get away with his reckless driving until he got near the outskirts of the city. Though, the idea of watching her father die in a burning wreck sent a shiver down Susie's spine. She half-wished he wasn't so reckless.

After the car made a speedier turn than Susie felt comfortable watching, the car roared down the street and vanished from sight no more than a minute after clearing the gravel and making contact with the asphalt. She popped her head out of the bushes and waited an extra minute just to make sure her father didn't turn the car around because he forgot his tie or some other bullshit. Only when she was more than 100% sure he wasn't coming back, she hopped out of the bush and made her way back home, the smile on her lips even wider than before.

Using the spare key she hid under an old and cracked garden gnome-monster, Susie unlocked the door, hung her backpack on a nearby coat rack, and headed for the kitchen. She flung open the fridge and grabbed some bread, meats of various kinds, eggs, and condiments. Setting all that on the counter, she reached for the same pan her father had used to cook his breakfast and began to fry the meats and eggs. First order of business for her now was to get some food in her belly.

While the food cooked, Susie raced upstairs and to her room, where she rushed to her bedside and crawled underneath the mattress, reaching out gingerly for a brandless plastic grocery bag. She opened it and inspected her very own 'secret stash' of alcohol she had gathered over the last few weeks with the help of Kris. She rushed back downstairs to turn over the now sizzling meat and pulled herself a can of light beer. She paused for a second, wishing that Kris could be with her to enjoy the booze, but she figured another opportunity would present itself soon enough, so she cracked open the can and took a hearty swig of it. The taste was less-than-ideal due to the lukewarmness, but after a little bit, she got used to the feeling and took another swig, letting out a satisfied exhale. "Beer isn't something one drinks for taste anyway," she told herself.

Susie turned her attention back to her cooking, and after a few more minutes on the fire, the meat was prepared. Carefully, she splattered mayo and mustard on two slices of bread before slapping the meat over and applying a bit of Worcestershire sauce for extra tanginess. After scooping the eggs on the same plate as her sandwich, she chugged the rest of the beer and crushed the can in her hands before tossing it back in the bag and reaching for a bottle of whiskey. With her meal in one hand and bottle of alcohol on the other, she made her way towards the living room and plopped on the couch, putting the plate down as she reached for the remote control. She turned on the TV and began channel browsing, all the while taking an occasional swig of whiskey.

There wasn't much to see on the tube aside from kids cartoons, the news, and movies nobody cared about. Susie wound up choosing one of the movie channels since she wasn't in the mood for depressing news nor cheery cartoons. Grabbing her sandwich with a single hand, she kicked up her feet on the coffee table and allowed her body to relax and enjoy the moment.

The movie was some neo-noir crime drama about a detective in some fictional dark city. Susie wasn't paying much notice to that, her attention instead set on the sandwich in her hand. After every two bites of it, she would chase down the food with whiskey. When she had drunk the last drop, she reached out for the bag and cracked another can of beer, this one a larger and harder brand with double the alcohol content of the first. It also tasted sweeter, meaning it was less lager and more ale.

With one final chomp, Susie devoured the last piece of her sandwich and eggs. With a satisfied burp, she patted her gut and laid back even further into the couch. ' _Man, I needed this day off,_ ' she told herself. Flipping her phone open let her get another good look at the time. 8:00 AM. She could hardly believe an hour had already flown by. She tapped on the main menu and brought up a list of phone contacts, the first name on that list being Kris, followed by her father, and then Noelle.

Susie highlighted Kris' number and strongly considered giving him a call to try and convince him to ditch school and come hang out with her. ' _It would be fun to have that nerd kick it with me,_ ' she thought to herself. Her cheeks turned red as her face grew hot. 'Just the two of us doing nothing but relaxing and downing our booze. Sounds kinda nice, actually.' She grinned, already fantasizing about the two having a perfect day away from school and sociability. But the more she thought about it with what little rationality hadn't yet gotten drowned by the alcohol, the more she realized that plan was doomed to fail. Somehow, Kris would use that charm and wit of his to convince her to sober up go back to school... and she would do it too! She had very little doubt about that.

Something about Kris was just so... irresistible.

The sound coming from the TV snapped Susie's attention away from her phone. Soon as she set her eyes on the tube, she realized the sounds were of a sex scene between the rugged detective and the femme fatale right after the two had finished shooting up a building full of mafia goons. As the teen dragon watched the two actors have a moment of intimacy and stress-relieving coitus set to a blaring noir score, she couldn't help but wonder what it would be like for Kris to take her as the hero of the movie was doing to the smoking hot femme fatale. Would she become a moaning wreck that only screamed for more? Would she cry Kris' name with every one of his thrusts into her womanhood? Would her head go hazy and numb from the pure ecstasy of the moment?

Susie's whole body grew ten times hotter as she flipped away from the channel and to the news network. As the boring-sounding newscaster talked about sports, she grabbed one of the sofa's pillows and screamed into it to clear the images now assaulting her mind. Her father's words again echoed in the back of her mind: ' _"I just hope to god you're at least using protection..."_ '

"I AM NOT DATING KRIS!" Susie shouted to no one in particular. In her rage, she bit the pillow as the desire to punch something welled within her. She could almost hear the laughter of her father, mocking her for getting this flustered over a simple joke. But she knew her old man better; she knew he had made more than just a simple quip at her expense...

Susie tossed the pillow to the side, downed the can of lager still in her hand and went ahead and popped the cord on a bottle of viking's blood mead, drinking more than half of the bottle before the thoughts began to fade away with the buzz setting in. She hiccuped a few times before she felt her rage die down, her attention again drawn to the television.

"Breaking news! We are getting reports of a riot happening in Ebott city. Going live to the scene is Marek."

Susie's attention focused on the news, though in her hazed state of mind, she could barely make sense of anything being shown or said. Most of the images were aerial shots of an unfolding riot. What looked like dozens of humans and monsters were attacking rows of police officers in full riot gear. There was dust everywhere, and some of the humans seemed to be covered in shiny red liquid that glistened against the sunlight.

"Isn't Ebott city where *hic* dad works?" Susie slurrily asked herself. She looked to the ceiling of her living room and tried to think of an answer, but in her haze, she couldn't really think of anything coherent. In the end, she shrugged her shoulders. "Nah! Not *hic* fucking interested!" she shouted as she flipped the channel again, this time to the one showing children cartoons. "He's a big dragon. He can fucking take care of *hic* himself. Besides, riots ain't my fucking business," she slurred out.

After a yawn, Susie set her attention back to the television, to be greeted by the rather infamous show 'My Little Boney,' which was about a group of skeleton children who lived in the magical and faraway land of "Osteocyte." From the looks on the promo banners underneath the airing episode, the channel was having an all-day marathon leading up to the season finale.

Susie again checked the time on her flip phone. It was now 9:02 AM. The feeling that she had spent another hour doing nothing sunk in and made her feel somewhat ill. She knew she could be spending her time better, but most of the ideas that came to her mind also happened to involve Kris in them. Very few came to mind that she could partake on her own.

With another groan, she swigged down the last half of mead and settled even further into the couch, the buzzed feeling in her head now having fully transitioned into a woozy, drowsy, drunk feeling. She put all the empty bottles and cans of booze back into the bag and decided that a good nap would help her get somewhat sober for the afternoon. She again brought out her phone and set the alarm for 2:01 PM, she then turned the TV volume down and took her boots off, laying her head onto the couch armrest and closing her eyes.

Thoughts in the mind of the young dragon drifted between what she wanted to do that afternoon, to Kris, to thoughts of Lancer, and even her mom. She honestly hadn't thought about her mother in months. She half-wondered what she was up to when her mind began to grow numb from a mixture of sloth and inebriation. Before any more thoughts could fully form in the teen's mind, she slipped into blissful unconsciousness.

As Susie began snoring, the cartoon show was interrupted by an urgent news report.

"This just in! The Ebott city riot continues to spiral out of control. Reports are coming in that the crowd of violent people only continues to grow by the minute! The Mayor has officially decreed a state of emergency. The national guard is expected to mobilize within the next half hour—"

Susie's snores grew louder, serving to cover what little sound the TV could make as the dragon slumbered without a care in the world.

 

* * *

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TO BE CONTINUED...


	2. Arisen

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* * *

Five monsters—a doe, a bear, a hand-headed humanoid, a rabbit, a stocky ogre—and a wounded human were cramped together inside the dilapidated mayoral office.

The monsters all wore business suits that would have once not been out of place at the government building, but after the last 24 hours and all the horrors it had wrought to the small town, the damage and blemishes on the suits made a disturbing amount of sense.

Three of the monsters—the doe, bear, and stocky ogre—were desperately pushing against a barricade of office chairs, office desks, and filing cabinets that had been hastily constructed to block off the wooden double door leading in and out of the mayor’s office. The human, who was garbed in standard—albeit shredded and bloodied—military gear, lay on a nearby couch, the other two monsters—hand-head and the rabbit—tending to his severe wounds, the expression on the two women grim as they fruitlessly tried to patch an inch-deep gash over the man’s chest.

“We can’t keep this up for much longer!” the bear monster shouted as he pushed against the shifting barricade. “If these freaks keep pushing, this whole damn thing’s coming down!”

“I’m too fucking young to die like this!” the ogre monster shouted in reply to his co-worker’s words. “Where the hell’s the calvary when you fucking need it!?” he shouted, his eyes glancing over to the wounded soldier for just a second before setting his full attention back to keeping the barricade stable.

“Hold it together, people! We’ve survived this far, and by the angel, we’ll hold out until help arrives!” the mayor of Hometown loudly encouraged her co-workers. The doe, who couldn’t have been older than 38, herself was pushing against the piled office furniture despite the heavy bandaging on her right arm and the trails of wet dust traveling down from her head to her face.

The mayor turned her whole body in place and pushed with her back, her eyes fixing themselves on the wounded soldier. “I-I thought you said… back-up was on its way!” she yelled at the human through gasps of air. “When we… found you... you promised... an evacuation!”

The human, through winces of pain and raspy breathing, just barely managed to wheeze out a reply to the mayor. “They were supposed to… send more. B-but when my s-squad was... was caught by a horde near the outskirts of your town…” he coughed and let out another strained wheeze, “We… We were the recon s-squad. We were supposed... to send out… info on how… how bad things were. B-but... with my whole squad wiped out…” he coughed again, only this time he spat out blood over the bodies of the two monsters tending to him, causing them to recoil from a mixture of surprise and shock. His weary eyes fell on the troubled doe’s. “Sorry Ma'am... but I couldn’t… tell you the truth… had to maintain… hope...”  
  
The mayor’s eyes widened as the full weight of the soldier’s words sunk in. She couldn’t even stammer out a reply as her eyes began to fog over with tears.

The soldier nodded weakly, his own eyes starting to glaze over. “The rest… of the army... setting up… quarantine. Ebott... Hometown... surrounding woods... Mount Ebott… the smaller suburbs… 450 square miles…” He let out a strained wheeze, blood pouring out of his mouth yet again, staining his teeth and lips. “May... the angel... have mercy… on us all…”

The mayor punched the barricade as she took in the new information. As an administrator, she could see the logic behind the army’s decision, primarily if the apocalyptic horror now playing before her eyes had already spread so far. Yet as a mother, she found the very idea of abandoning such a large area to its grisly fate unacceptable. “I-is there going to be an evacuation?” she desperately asked the soldier.

The soldier weakly nodded. “In... Ebott. I-if you… make it… the checkpoint... army… set up… airlift...” He coughed up more blood, his breathing becoming even more strained than before. “I’m... really… sorry… no one’s coming… anymo—” the soldier's last word became loss in a gurgle as his eyes began to fade away as his head dropped, a long drawn out wheeze exiting the human’s lips as his body slowly went limp.

The moment the human took his last breath, a yellow soul slowly rose out of his body and hovered above the corpse for a second before a crack audibly resonated over the office. Before any of the monsters present even had a chance to fully absorb the sight, the heart shattered, the shards vanishing before even hitting the ground.

The mayor was left horrified by the sight. Never in her life could she have imagined seeing a human soul shatter before her eyes. She had read about it in books about the old war, but to see it in person was a whole different experience.

The doe slowly turned to face the barricade, grimacing as she noticed that with every passing minute, the people—colleagues and friends—holding back the swarm of invaders on the other side of the double doors grew more and more fatigued. Worse yet, the doors already had several splits running across them. At any second, they could break, and no barricade would protect them from the flood of crazed and mutated freaks.

The mayor closed her eyes and sighed profoundly. Slowly, she made her way to her work desk and took a seat on the battered chair. She made a long glancing sweep of her office and the survivors still within, the realization forming in her mind, only serving to reinforce her feelings of faintness and tiredness. “No choice now,” she whispered as she reached out for the phone on her desk and, with practiced speed, dialing a number and pressing the speaker button.

The dial tone rang for five whole pauses, each one only serving to further add to the mayor’s already high anxiety.

The last dial tone was cut short as the call’s recipient picked up. “Mom! MOM! Oh, thank the angel you’re still alright! W-where you able to make the call for help!?” a cheery, albeit fatigued voice resonated from the other end of the phone line.

The mayor let out a sigh of relief. “Noelle, listen to what I’m about to say very carefully. There’s no help coming. The last soldier sent out to scout our town just died in front of me, and the whole building is overrun by… whatever those things are. It’s not all bad news though. There is going to be an evacuation, but it’s happening in Ebott.”

The mayor looked at the survivors in her office. Each one was a trusted colleague and friend of hers, all of them supporting her work as mayor through thick and thin. Many times they could have fled, yet despite all the horrors and the knowledge that death was inevitable at this point, they had stuck around. Even now, despite all of them looking as if they are ready to drop dead from a mixture of exhaustion and terror, they gave the mayor a nod of assurance.

The mayor closed her eyes, took a long exhale, and nodded to them all. “Noelle… I-I know that... you and I haven’t exactly looked eye to eye on some... things. After your father… I-I be...became more and more focused on work. It was the only way to keep myself from falling apart from the pain of having to bury Rudy…” The doe’s eyes began to glaze over as painful memories she had tried to bury finally came flooding back to her. Despite the ache now ripping at her heart, she swiftly took a deep inhalation to steady herself. “Noelle… you have to escape. If you stay in the house—in this town—any longer, you’ll… you’ll...”

“M-mom!” Noelle started, voice shaky and uneven, “yo...you’re going to make it out... r-right?” the teen doe sobbingly asked. “You’re just calling to let me know you’re on your way home right now, r-right!?”

There was a loud crack of wood. Every set of eyes turned to the door holding back the horde of crazed monsters and humans.

“What was that!?” Noelle shouted in reply to the racket.

More snaps and breaking as the doors began to disintegrate. Dozens of cold hands grasped out from the openings on the wood for anything to devour, all the while every person still capable of doing so rushed forward to try and keep the barricade from falling apart from the oncoming rush of crazed creatures.

The mayor grabbed the phone and put it to her ear. “Noelle! Get out of the house! There’s a way to get to Ebott from here, but it requires the use of the old tunnel from back in the war. It hasn’t been opened for nearly 60 years, but it’s the only way to reach the city without having to use the highway!”

Scrams and shouts began to echo in the office as the barricade all but fell apart under the assault and weight of the crazed horde. Already, some of the cold hands could reach out and touch those bravely holding the barrier together.

The mayor’s eyes widened as she took in the sight before her. “Noelle... escape from this doomed town. Find as many survivors as you can… lead them to Ebott.”

“I-I-I CAN’T” Noelle shouted from the other end of the line, her voice shaky and sorrowful. “PLEASE, MOM! I’M…” the teenage dow on the other end of the line began weeping. “...I’m not strong enough...”

“Noelle Holiday! You are much stronger than you think! You can do this, I know you can!” the mayor bellowed back to her daughter.

What was left of the barricade completely collapsed the instant the mayor finished her words, the horde of ravenous monsters and humans flooding into the office as they grasped at anyone unlucky enough to be in their path. Some of the survivors tried fighting back with whatever they could get their hands on, but with their strength so exhausted, it was a fruitless endeavor. Screams began to explode all around as the crazed horde started its grim feast.

The mayor sat back on her chair, a warm smile forming on her lips. “Noelle... my little light in the dark… I have always loved you, even if I’ve been bad at showing it. Please… stay alive…” The doe slowly lowered the phone, tears now freely running down her cheeks as she heard the voice of her daughter screaming from the small speaker. With one final second of hesitation, she pressed her finger on the latch, ending the call. Slowly, she turned to face the approaching mob.

Mayor Holiday closed her eyes. “Rudy, my love… I’ll be with you soon…” she whispered as she felt herself being grabbed by dozens of cold hands all at the same time.

The sounds of moans, groans, ripping clothing, and tearing flesh filled the office.

 

* * *

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**CHAPTER TWO**

**Arisen**

* * *

* * *

 

Susie’s eyes snapped open, her body yanking itself into the world of the awakened.

The dragon teen yawned and rubbed the grog out of her eyes. Rising from her sleeping position, she tried sitting, only for her forehead and eyes to throb as if a hand was grasping at her very brain.

“Oh, god-fucking-dammit... Forgot about the hangover!” Susie bemoaned as she shook her head to get the last of the haziness out of her. She looked at the still playing TV and saw that the ‘My Little Boney’ show was still on. However, the show itself was muted, the only sound coming from the television being a high-pitched buzzing, all the while a government warning flashed in the middle of the screen.

“What the fuck…” Susie said, eyes squinting as she tried to read the message scrolling across the screen. The harder she worked though, the more her head pulsed and pounded, her post-sleep grog and hangover doing her no favors in the endeavor.

The buzzing warning playing over the cartoon made Susie think about what she had seen on the TV earlier. Aside from ‘My Little Boney,’ there had been a movie and news channel. Something about the news broadcast she saw right before sleeping nagged at the back of her mind though, almost like she forgot something. She looked at the TV again, all the while putting a hand on her chin. ‘What the hell was it that I’m forgetting here?’ she thought. The buzzing, although low in volume, still bothered her.

Little by little, she began recalling the chain of actions she had done right before sleeping. ‘I watched what I’m sure was some kind of porn movie, saw a bit of the news, got pretty damn drunk, switched over to the cartoon channel, set the volume down, set my phone alarm, and went to sleep so I would wake up by—’ “Oh shit,” Susie whispered to herself, her eyes widening at the sudden rush of clarity washing over her.

The teen immediately reached for her phone and flipped it open to see what time it was. However, the screen did not activate as it was supposed to. ‘What the fuck?’ Susie thought to herself as she pressed every button, only for the phone to show no reaction. Despite the fog of inebriation still clouding her mind, she could tell that somehow, her phone had died. “How?” She asked herself. Last she had checked the battery, it had been almost at full level. Even assuming she left something running in the background, it would have taken nearly a full day for the phone to die.

Susie shot out of the couch, shaking the haze of sleepiness as best as she could, and scrambled to the coat hanger and extracted her phone charger from one of the inner bags on her backpack. Without wasting another moment, she rushed to the nearest power outlet and plugged her phone. After a few seconds of waiting, she pressed the power button and sighed in relief as her phone sprung back to life.

“Goddammit, got scared for a second there,” Susie whispered to herself as she watched the boot-up screen. After another half-minute, a small warning came up saying that the phone was running on external power and would need time to charge. The teen pressed the okay button on the pad and looked at the clock displayed on the main menu screen.

7:00 AM

Susie’s eyes widened again. “...What the fuck...?” She looked down at the date this time.

Thursday, April 15, 202X.

Susie’s heart began racing at a hundred miles an hour. When she had gone to sleep, she had KNOWN it was Wednesday, yet, her phone was telling her that it was now Thursday. ‘That’s goddamned impossible,’ she thought to herself. The only way that any of it could make any sense would be if she slept for almost 24 hours.

Susie put a hand on her head. ‘24 hours, and my dad didn’t wake me?’ she wondered, struggling to try and make sense of the situation. ‘I know my dad. There is no FUCKING way he would let me sleep that long on the couch, especially while drunk off my ass!’

With some hesitation, Susie walked towards the window facing the driveway and looked outside. To her surprise, there was no car. She knew that the only times the car wasn’t on the pavement was when her father was at work. She walked back to the counter and flipped her phone open again, both to recheck the time, and also to see the percentage her phone was at.

Sure enough, based on the time of day, the fact that there wasn’t a car wasn’t at all unusual. Yet, something in the pit of Susie’s gut told her something completely different. With no other recourse, she began to look around the house for signs of her father. She looked everywhere, even down in the basement, but her father was nowhere to be seen, almost as if he hadn’t returned home in during the time she had been sleeping.

‘Okay, this is starting to get fucking eerie,’ Susie told herself as she returned to the living room. She again walked up to her phone and flipped it open to check for messages and missed calls. Almost instantly, she was surprised when she saw several missed calls Kris and her father. On seeing the number of missed calls from the two, she noticed that Kris had many more missed calls than her father, who merely had 10 compared to Kris’ 20. ‘Typical. Kris cares more about me than my old man does,’ she told herself. She shouldn’t have been surprised at all, honestly. Yet, a part of her couldn’t quite believe it.

On closer inspection, Susie noticed that her father had left her a voice message. The teen made a note to hear it later as she navigated away from the phone log and into her text messages. On opening her inbox, she saw 7 messages from Kris, with one from Noelle and one from the school.

Susie checked the school message first. It was the expected truancy warning. She groaned and deleted it, her father probably already gotten a copy of it. She would no doubt be hearing about that next time she saw her old man.

Susie checked Noelle’s message next.

“Hey Susie, don’t forget that you and Kris are coming over to my house for tutoring! I’m going to have more snacks set up this time, seeing as the last time you came you kinda ate everything. Honestly, i’m both impressed and appalled by that appetite of yours! See you both after school!”

Susie felt a warm smile form on her lips. To think that just five months ago, she had barely spoken to the doe. Now there she was practically best friends with Hometown’s perfect little princess.

Susie navigated to Kris’ messages next. A torrent of texts greeted her, far too many to read at once. “Oh goddammit, Kris,” Susie groaned. With her phone battery life as low as it was, she didn’t want to take any chances, so she decided to leave the reading of the messages for later. She did make a note, however, that the last message sent to her by Kris had been 8 hours ago.

Susie closed her phone and let it charge in peace. Though she still found it hard to believe, she really had no choice but to accept the fact that somehow, she had slept a whole 24 hours. She wondered if the food and booze she had consumed before taking her nap had had something to do with that, though it could have also just been her draconic nature. Some dragons were known to sleep for long periods, after all. There were even legends about dragons and their century-long sleep cycles.

Susie looked back at the television. The previously playing ‘my little boney’ still had the emergency broadcast banner over it, the scrolling text in the middle of the screen warning against going outside and to stay indoors and lock up every entrance, with the added suggestion of staying calm and not letting anyone from outside into your home. The banner, combined with the droning buzz, made the show completely unwatchable, so the teen grabbed the remote and flipped through all the channels her TV could access, only to be met with the same results: banner, buzzing, and a warning about a regional emergency.

Susie finally shut off the television and tossed the remote against the sofa. ‘What the hell’s going on?’ she wondered, her heart racing, and her nerves rising to their edges. Just as her nerves were reaching peak unease, her gut growled as an intense pain stabbed at her stomach and intestines. What was more, her throat felt parched and her mouth dry. Before she could do anything else to try and figure out her current situation, she needed water and food.

Without wasting a single second, Susie ran into the kitchen, her eyes fixing themselves on the sink. She pushed aside several dirty dishes and turned on the faucet, letting the water run for a few seconds before leaning over, using her hands as a makeshift cup, and guzzling down water like a fish. After nearly 50 mouthfuls of water, she turned the faucet off and stepped back, a small, tasteless burp escaping her lips as she took several deep breaths of air to recover her composure.

With her thirst completely quenched, Susie turned around and opened the fridge, snatching whatever she could. She wouldn’t have time to prepare a proper meal, so she began stuffing all sorts of relatively edible foodstuff into her maw, practically inhaling her meal despite a small nagging voice in the back of her head telling her she needed to consider rationing due to whatever emergency was occurring just outside her house. ‘I’ll worry about that shit later,’ the teen thought as she continued stuffing her mouth. ‘I need food BAD.’

Five minutes after savagely devouring more than half the fridge’s worth of food, Susie let out a satisfied burp as she closed the refrigerator and ran back to her phone on the counter. Without wasting another minute, she flipped the device open and navigated to her voicemail inbox. There, she highlighted the first and only message, the one her father had recorded, the display telling her it had been sent 10 hours ago.

‘9:00 PM last night… way past the time my dad usually works…’ Susie thought to herself as she hesitantly highlighted the message. Susie moved to play the broadcast, but her finger hovered over the activation button instead. On the one hand, she didn’t want to hear her father’s voice after all the grief he had been giving her the last few days, but on the other hand, something terrible was going on outside, and her father might have some kind of idea as to what it was. Would he start his message by yelling at her again? Would he make another of his cringy jokes about her love life with Kris? Or, would she hear something worse?

With a deep sigh, Susie steeled herself and pressed the play button.

On the other end of the phone line, Susie could hear her father's strained growl. “Susie… I… don’t know how much time there is. I know you’re still pissed off at me, but this is urgent. What I’m about to tell you is impor—” The sound of shouting from somewhere not far from her father’s location interrupted the dragon’s message.

“Phlogiston! Where the hell are you? We need to go fetch those supplies before those freaks catch up!”

The dragon grumbled in response to his name. “SHUT THE FUCK UP!” he roared at whoever was making the noise, “I’M TRYING TO LEAVE A MESSAGE FOR MY DAUGHTER!”

“You’re doing that now!? Goddammit, we were sent out to get supplies! You can try and get a call to her when we are back with the troops!”

“I KNOW! BUT THIS IS THE ONLY TIME I’VE GOTTEN A GOOD SIGNAL! I SURE AS HELL I’M NOT GOING TO WASTE IT!”

“Fine then, but make it quick! Those fucking freaks can’t be too far behind us.”

Susie couldn’t help but chuckle a little at the exchange. Even in a state of emergency, her father wasn’t one to embrace subtlety one bit.

“Sorry about that. It's just that me and the guys…” There was a deep weary from her father. “Look, I’m not going to sugarcoat it; we are in some deep shit. All hell’s broken loose in Ebott. Hell, it’s probably just as bad over in Hometown too. I have no idea when it started, but it was already underway when I got to work. Shit’s been going downhill since.” There was a pause, during which Susie could hear her father’s tense breathing. “The good news is that the military got here pretty damn quick and has been fighting off those hungry fuckers. The bad news is that aside from the eastern portion of Ebott, everything around a 450 square mile radius has been designated a quarantine zone. Hometown’s shit out of luck, and so are most of the other suburbs nearby. I-I mean, fuck, the army’s barely holding on to Ebott as is! Listen to me, and listen damn well: you need to get out of Hometown. You and that boyfriend of yours—don’t even try to lie to me, I know you two are like fucking peanut butter and chocolate at this point—need to find as many people as possible and get them out of there. Yeah, I know I’m asking a lot of you, but this is a fucking state of emergency! You’re going to need weapons though. I have something in my room. Under the bed, there’s a safe; the combination is 245810. I know I never taught you properly, but I know you’ve seen enough movies to know how to use ‘em. Just… don’t point it at your face. I mean, it’s not go—” Another shout erupted from somewhere not far away, only this time, that was followed by the unmistakable sound of gunfire.

“SHIT! PHLOGISTON, THOSE FREAKS FOUND US!”

Her father let out a loud growl as Susie heard the sound of shifting gear and static. “HOLD THEM OFF! I’M—”

Susie heard more shouting, more shooting, and something hitting the phone hard right before the line went dead. The message ended there.

“The fuck?” Susie told herself as she replayed the message again just to make sure she had heard everything correctly. By the time she was done hearing it again, she felt weak in the knees, the words ‘quarantine’ and ‘military’ and her father’s request… it all made her head spin. She was still getting used to the idea of being sociable and amicable towards people, yet her father now wanted her to lead some kind of rescue mission in Hometown? She didn’t even know what the hell had caused the whole world to lose its mind in the first place.

“Fuck,” Susie cursed to herself. Never in her life had she been so confused on what to do next. Hometown wasn’t exactly a place one expected an end-of-the-world emergency to play out, yet like it or not, she was now stuck in the middle of one such mess.

Susie exited from her voicemail inbox and navigated towards her contacts. With practiced swiftness, she highlighted Kris’ number, pressed the dial button, and brought the phone to her ear, waiting and hoping desperately that he would pick up her call.

“I'm sorry, but the person you are trying to reach is unavailable and has not set up a voicemail.”

Susie growled and called again, only for the same message to greet her. She called yet again, but the phone just kept on repeating the same line. With each attempt, she grew more and more impatient, yet at the same time, a consuming sense of dread began to develop as well. If the world really was falling apart just outside her home, could Kris also be in peril? The very thought made the pit of her gut feel ice cold.

“Oh shit, I almost forgot about his text messages!” Susie told herself as she navigated back to her text inbox. She inspected her phone charger. It was now at 25%, ‘more than enough to not have this piece of crap die on me suddenly,’ she thought as she opened Kris’ texts.

Susie’s eyes widened as she was met with a veritable torrent of messages:

“Susie, where are you? I didn’t see you at school this morning. Did you decide to ditch again? We talked about that crap. You can’t be ditching class. How are we supposed to get your grades up? At least let me know when you plan on doing it that way we can come up with an excuse to give Alphys? I’ll text you later. My mom's in our classroom. Something about Alphys not showing up to work today. Mk and Snowy haven’t come to school either. They're usually among the first to show up to. Odd.”

“Susie, you okay? You didn’t reply to my message. If you’re mad about the sandwiches, I swear to god I didn’t make them for you to eat! How was I supposed to know that they would get mixed up with the ones we were going to give Berdly? It doesn’t matter, Berdly didn’t come to school. Whole place's on lockdown right now. They've told us nothing except that there's a disturbance nearby. I’ll let you know if something else shows up, some cops wanna talk to us. Please get back to me soon.”

Susie pinched the ridge of her nose. “So that’s why those damn things tasted so salty,” she told herself. She made a mental note to talk to Kris about it at a better time as she resumed reading the messages.

“Susi please tell me you’re okay? This silence's not cool. The school’s getting evacuated. Something’s happening in town. Something bad. Some kind of riot. Monsters and humans are running around screaming and attacking randomly. I’ve never seen so many humans in Hometown though. Did something happen the next town over?”

Susie felt a chill run down her spine as she continued reading.

“Oh god Susie, some bad crap is going down! The police got us to evacuate school. Officer Undyne looked absolutely horrified by something, but she wouldn’t tell us what was up. She and the other officers then got into a fight with a crowd of rioters. None looked like they were from town. I managed to catch a quick glimpse of a few though. Some of them looked like they were already dead! I’m waiting for my mom right now. She said she needed to make sure the kindergarteners were safe. Please, get back to me as soon as you can. I need to know if you are safe!”

“Shit, shit, shit. It’s bad Really BAD. The whole town’s in chaos. People are running in the streets screaming, and the rioters, oh god they’re not alive! Even worse, they're attacking anyone they see. It’s like a zombie movie, except these guys don’t seem to want to die. I have seen some of them walking around without a head and a few that can only qualify as nothing but spines crawling on the ground like worms! Worse is that its monsters too. How is that possible when monsters don’t have blood to transmit shit? Susie please answer me! I need to know if you are still okay!”

Susie read the next message. It had been typed as if in a panic, as it lacked almost all punctuation.

“Susie I’m home or what left of it anyway things are bad mom’s hurt bad we were driving away from the chaos when one of those things jumped in front of our van and smashed his head right through the windshield it bit Toriel on the arm before she was able to swerve enough to dislodge it but it caused us to crash the van near the house I got out of it mostly unharmed but mom’s not doing well oh god there is so much dust everywhere and mom is too weak and too faint to do anything anymore I don’t know what to do anymore please help me!”

The next and final message was longer than all the others. It was also typed with far better grammar than all the previous ones, the care with which Kris had written showing that the message was important. Just seeing it made Susie feel an icy sensation spreading from the tips of her fingers to the rest of her body.

“Susie. I think this might be it. My mother is. The whole town’s gone. Noelle already told me what’s going on. She says that help is coming, but that was hours ago. I’m honestly not so sure anymore. Not that it matters anyway, we’re all going to die one way or another. I mean, I’m probably typing to a dead person right now. Yeah, I’m not going to delude myself anymore. The reason you haven’t answered any of my messages is because you are probably dead. I tried to lie to myself, but it’s time I faced the truth. I just wish I could have told you just how much you meant to me, how happy you made my life these past 5 months. I really wish we could have kept what we had gone longer, keep the happy times rolling and see where it took us, but life had other plans. I just wish I could have spent this last day by your side and tell you what I’m typing now directly to you. You really were my one bright spot in life, even if you didn’t think it. Catti, or rather the creature that was once Catti, is standing outside my door as I type this. She’s not alone either. I can hear dozens of the things, growling, moaning, hissing in hunger. They are banging on the door, hoping to get in. I’ve done my best to barricade myself, but I don’t have much hope of survival. Noelle already knows too. Bless her soul, she wanted to rush to my help, but I told her that I’m practically dead at this point and that if any of us deserved to live, it was her. She cried so much Susie, but it fills my heart with some joy knowing that at least one of us three is going to survive this nightmare. I hope that maybe when I go, I’ll see you in whatever afterlife is waiting. Maybe Ralsei and Lancer will also be waiting for us there? No, that’s just wishful thinking. I guess there’s nothing left to do now than just sit back and wait to die. I’ll be seeing you soon, Susie.”

Susie almost dropped the phone from the shock of what she had just read, her hands curling into fists and her eyes watering as the desire to take off running to the aid of her best friend was barely kept in check by cold rationality. If she ran out there without any preparation, she was only going to get herself—and by extension, Kris—killed. ‘But I sure as hell can’t just sit here and let him die!’ she angrily told herself.

Remembering what her father had told her about a weapon, Susie closed up her phone and rushed upstairs and into her father’s room. She had only gone inside a few times, so she wasn’t used to the feeling of intruding into her father’s ‘den.’ Susie had to tell herself that it was an emergency. ‘Besides, he told me to fucking go into his room in the first place,’ she reminded herself. Ignoring the old family photos on the dresser, she walked up to her father’s bed and crouched to get a good look under it. Sure enough, she spotted a medium-sized safe there.

With a single kick, Susie pushed the bed out of the way as her eyes fell on the now exposed safe and keypad. Remembering the combination her father had told her in his message, she knelt down carefully and entered the code. With a mechanical click and the whir of gears, the safe sprung open.

Susie grabbed the safe door’s handle and pulled, revealing the contents within. The teen’s eyes widened as she got a good look at what was basically his father’s ‘treasure hoard’: wads of cash, old vintage magazines from the 195X’s, what looked like a signed baseball bat, globe, and hat, and a single firearm: a Mauser C9X with a big red number 9 engraved on both sides of the grip, and a wooden holster that looked as if it could also serve as a stock. Next to the pistol was a sizable box of 9mm bullets and a cleaning kit.

Susie reached out for the box and took count of the bullets inside, “30 bullets,” she told herself as she took the ammunition out of the box and stuffed them into one of her inner jacket pockets. She pulled on the gun’s slider and peeked inside. Sure enough, the gun was already loaded. ‘No surprise there,’ she mused, remembering just how big a gun-nut her father was. She closed the slide and reached out for the wooden holster and rammed the gun inside before strapping it around her waist. After a bit more consideration, she also took the cleaning kit and the cash and stuffed them into another of her jacket pockets. ‘Money’s always good to have, and I’d be crazy not to take the cleaning kit with me, even if I have no fucking idea how to use it.’

With her business in her father’s room finished, Susie rushed back downstairs. The first thing she checked was her phone. To her shock, the battery power was now at 60%. While not optimal, it would have to do for now. She then reached for her backpack and turned it over, letting all her school supplies spill on the floor unceremoniously. “Won’t be needing you anytime soon,” she said as she started roaming around the first floor looking for survival essentials to stuff into the now empty bag. She grabbed a lamp, matches, a first-aid kit, bottles of water, the rest of the alcohol, whatever packaged food was still around the house, and her phone charger. She also reached into her pockets and pulled the cleaning kit and money and stuffed both into the backpack as well.

With one final check, Susie unlocked the front door and bolted down the clearing of her house and into the highway leading to Hometown. As she rushed down the road, she grabbed her phone and dialed a number she didn’t often call directly. It probably had been a few hours, and the chances of her still being alive were slim, but aside from Kris, she was the only other person she could contact. Besides, as much as she disliked the idea, she had to follow her father’s possible last request.

“H-Hello?” a fatigued voice resonated from the other end of the line.

“Sup nerd. Really happy to be hearing your voice right now,” Susie cheerfully answered.

“Su...S-Susie… is that... r-really you?” Noelle meekly asked in a cracking, elated voice. “Oh thank the angel! I-I thought I had lost you too…”

Susie grinned on her end of the line. “Sorry about the radio silence. It’s a long story.”

“Susie! Where are you right now!?” Noelle softly shouted from her end of the line. “Is… is Kris w-with you?”

Susie was somberly silent for a second. The question she had wanted a reply to, answered before she could even pose it. “I’m… not with Kris.”

Noelle let out a sniffle from her end of the line. “Oh…”

Susie’s brow furrowed. “Noelle, I know what happened to him. He is in trouble; big trouble! I’m rushing to his place right now to save his ass!” She bit her bottom lip as she fought back the image of the human’s dead body greeting her.

“Susie... everyone is... dead... Kris is... p-probably de—”

“I don’t want to hear it!” Susie snapped, interrupting Noelle’s words. “I’m not giving up on him, and neither should you!”

There was silence for a second. Susie began to worry that her call had somehow become disconnected, but her fears were laid to rest relatively quickly when Noelle again answered on her end of the line. “...Y-you’re right. I’m… I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be despairing so easily.”

Susie sighed. “Honestly, I can’t blame you. Sounds like shit really has hit the fan. But we’re going to make it, okay? The three of us are going to fucking survive this, you hear me!?” she encouraged her doe friend. Sure, it was just a bit on the wishful thinking side, but a little false hope was better than none.

“Yeah… Yeah, we are!” Noelle exclaimed with newfound vigor.

“Yeah!” Susie allowed herself a victorious grin. “Okay, here’s the plan: right now, stay where you are. Once I have Kris, we’ll come to find you. Then we’ll get out of Hometown and head for Ebott. Just hang in there until then, okay!”

“Susie... d-don’t die. A-and if you can… sa...save him, pl-pl...please…”

“You don’t have to tell me twice. I’ll speak to you soon then,” Susie replied as she snapped her phone shut, ending the call. ‘Please, don’t you do anything stupid until I get Kris,’ the dragon thought to herself as she put her phone away and increased her pace into a jog, all of her thoughts turning towards the singular goal of finding and saving Kris.

Susie reached for the wooden holster and brought out the Mauser pistol. She gave it another quick glance, almost feeling remorse over the fact that such an ornamented weapon had to be used. She again slid back the receiver to make sure it wouldn’t fail when she needed it most. It was a weapon of last resort though, as she had seen enough zombie movies to know that gunfire without a suppressor would only work against her. ‘If only I had bludgeon, or an axe, or something to swing,’ she thought, placing the firearm back in its holster. She remembered the bat in her father’s safe and groaned at the fact that she had ignored it in favor of the pistol. ‘Too late to go back now. Going to have to make do with a pipe or a heavy stick when I get into town,’ she thought to herself.

As the dragon drew closer and closer to Hometown, she desperately hoped to whatever gods that weren’t pissed off at her that the human was safe and sound.

* * *

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TO BE CONTINUED...


End file.
